Are we talking of totalitarian Russia, some distant gulag where the sun never shines?
Or, maybe it's Kim Jong-un's North Korea where to even mention the word 'Latin' would result in several life sentences doing hard labour two miles down a mineshaft?
But no, it is neither of those, it is our own dear capital city of Wales, centre of couth and culture.....'cept that you can't have any Latin Masses see?
"Else we'll send Bob the Basher round to sort you nasty little Tridentine swine out..."
Nicandro Porcelli has a report on how a small (but stable group) asked for their rights (Mass in Latin).
Read Nicandro's far too charitable report on being 'Welsh, warm and fuzzy) HERE
Cardiff has always been since the +Smith days (and it would appear +Stack) a bit of a desert. I'm not sure, under the terms of Summorum Pontificum that anyone has the right to ban the Mass of Ages - but hey ho - you can always come 'up the road' to Hereford, where Fr. Anthony OSB celebrates the Mass of Ages every Sunday evening at 6.30pm at the Poor Clare Convent, Much Birch!
ReplyDeleteIt is disgraceful that the parish concerned does not consider the teaching of the Holy Father Benedict XV1 worthy of his parish.
ReplyDeleteGod help us all as our church becomes a protestant wasteland.
Patrick Fahey
You do have to have a core group to start with (in double figures), but I suggest that those who have been prohibited access to the EF Mass 'get stuck in' and go through the whole process, as set out by the Latin Mass Society.
ReplyDeleteA Step-by-step Guide
1. Establish a ‘stable group’. Members of the group do NOT have to reside in the same parish. They do NOT have to have an attachment to the Traditional Mass going back to 1969. They must rather be a group sufficiently committed and sufficiently local that if a Mass were established for them, they would support it. There is no minimum size fixed for such groups, but to be taken seriously you need to show that numbers are at least in double figures. Your local Latin Mass Society Representative should be informed at this stage and should be able to put you in touch with other people who will support your project.
2. Write to the parish priest. You need to choose a parish either where most of the members of your group live, or one where an additional Mass would be easiest to establish (i.e. one where there are not too many Sunday Masses taking place already), or one where the priest is most friendly to your cause. If this Parish Priest is unable to help you it will be up to the Bishop to suggest to nearby parishes that they may accommodate your group if that is the best way forward.
3. Include with your letter a simple petition in its support (‘We the undersigned support this request for a Sunday Mass in the X area celebrated in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite’), and get all the members of your group to sign it, and include their postal addresses. KEEP COPIES OF WHAT YOU SEND.
4. If the parish priest does not respond within a fortnight, send your letter to him again; it may have got lost or forgotten about. Politely suggest that if you do not hear back from him within a month you will take the matter to the bishop, in accordance with the provisions of the Motu Proprio.
5. If you receive a negative response, you may be able (politely) to help your parish priest to overcome any misunderstandings about the Motu Proprio with the aid of the FAQs below. If his response remains negative, or if he does not respond at all, you must write to the bishop explaining that you have applied for the Traditional Mass under the Motu Proprio and are passing the matter to him as the Motu Proprio requires. Include with your letter to the bishop a copy of your letter(s) to the Parish Priest, and your petition.
6. With the Bishop, as with the Parish Priest in step 4 and 5: if there is no response after a fortnight, write again with a month deadline. If there are objections based on a misreading of the Motu Proprio, you may be able to respond with the help of the FAQs below. If, finally, there is a negative response or no response at all, you need to write to the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei.
7. For this step, you should get in touch with the Latin Mass Society office. We will advise you on the wording of your letter, and we can arrange hand delivery in Rome, which will give your letter more force. You will need to include with your letter all your previous correspondence: letters to and from the parish priest and the bishop.
It is of the utmost importance that all of the letters from your side are polite, succinct, clearly written, and well informed about the Motu Proprio.
Will you get a response? The PCED may, or may not, acknowledge your letter. They will read it, however, and they will be in touch with your Bishop. They will seek to negotiate with the Bishop, and this may take time, and may result in an offer from the Bishop of a Mass in a different church than originally anticipated, in a rota of churches, or with some other arrangement. Such offers, even if not ideal, should be accepted if at all practical, and used as a basis for the establishment of a community committed to the Traditional Mass, which will demonstrate to the Bishop and local priests that allowing the Traditional Mass will not cause problems and divisions in the diocese.
Thanks for this "magnificent seven" steps to liturgical heaven. Yes, Cardiff is a See with a history of trouble and suspicion over TLM. There are people here who have to and do travel. The Novus Ordo Rite is sung in Latin occasionally at the cathedral by the Dean who is not a fan of the LMS. There were "regular" EF/TLM masses said in Cardiff before but they have been cancelled as we can't get co-operation. The situation now is the priest at a church we have said mass in for years said he had only begrudgingly allowed High and Low TLM there before because it was "supposedly organised by the diocese". Perhaps he feels tricked? All very sad and shows you that even if you do get masses established in an area you are at the whim of the clergy.
ReplyDelete